


Memories

by AWorld0fMy0wn



Category: Emmerdale, charity dingle - Fandom, soaps - Fandom, vanessa woodfield - Fandom, vanity - Fandom
Genre: Angst, Charity's past, F/F, Memories
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-14
Updated: 2019-01-14
Packaged: 2019-10-10 08:45:02
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,846
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17422655
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AWorld0fMy0wn/pseuds/AWorld0fMy0wn
Summary: Charity's visit to Obadiah leads her on a mini trip down memory lane.





	Memories

**Author's Note:**

> This was initially written for Vanity Fest (but ended up staying hidden in my files).

Charity wasn’t sure what had woken her up; whether it was the sound of the rain on the window panes, one of the boys whimpering, or Vanessa’s singing. It was barely higher than a whisper, yet in the silence of the night every little sound seemed to echo round Tug Ghyll.

She glanced at her phone. 03:30. Too early to get out of bed. She listened to Vanessa’s melodious voice instead. She knew that if things were the other way round, her girlfriend would be straight out of bed, right by her side. She had warned her. She knew Vanessa deserved better.

She listened on. The shushing. The gentle tiptoeing footsteps across the landing. The tired cries.

Moses.

She hadn’t even considered that it might have been _her_ son Vanessa had woken up for.

The bed creaked underneath her as she relieved it off her weight. She picked Vanessa’s dressing gown from on top of the bedroom stool and put it on. For someone who spent half her nights at that house, she barely had anything of hers there. She liked using Vanessa’s stuff instead. She’d never say this aloud, but it made her feel warmer and safer, as though she had Vanessa’s arms around her at all times.  

“ _Though the world is fast asleep_ ,” Vanessa sang.

 “Don’t stop on my account,” Charity whispered. She hoped her voice wouldn’t wake the little boy. He was all snuggled up against Vanessa’s chest, his hand clasped around a tuff of her hair.

“Did we wake you?” Vanessa asked.

“Well, holding a concert at 3 in the morning might not be the best of ideas,” she said. She noticed the look of alarm on Vanessa’s tired face. “Oh come on, babe. I can’t complain, can I? Didn’t even hear him.”

“You looked so peaceful.” Vanessa’s face lit up. Her smile reached her eyes, broken only as the little one tugged at her hair. “Shh, shh.”

“You should continue your karaoke session,” Charity suggested, with a grin on her face. “He was enjoying that.”     

“I’d need to charge if there’s an audience.”

Charity smiled and walked out of the room. She stopped right outside, her head against the wall. “ _Though your pillow soft and deep,”_ Vanessa continued.

Charity hummed alongside her. She could almost hear her mother singing that song. Mary Poppins had always been a favourite in her household.

Since she had paid Obadiah a visit, her mother had been constantly on her mind. Every little thing seemed to bring memories of her to the forefront of her mind. A blonde beauty. Bubbly and loving. A huge grin on her face. A belly laugh that always made her giggle; she could almost still hear it now. Dancing round the house with a cloth in hand, whistling to herself. Memories she had all but forgotten she had. This time round they weren’t all of screaming rows between her and her father. They weren’t all taunts and teases, banging of dishes, or shattering plates.

“You were just in the way,” he had said. She remembers, now. The dirty looks he would give her. The way she would stuff a cake in her mouth and scurry off to her room. After a while there were no more cakes. Only glass bottles. He didn’t even have to say anything anymore. At the sound of the key turning in the lock, she would run to her room, bury her head in a school book, pretend to do her homework, yearning to please him, for a positive report card, to be praised for something rather than be on the receiving end of the constant forlorn looks. On other days, when he felt slightly more social, at the first shout of “Charity” she would hop into bed, hide herself under her quilt. She would lie in the same spot for hours on end, a prisoner in her own bed. She would much rather stay there, and skip the little affection she got at school, than bow her head and serve the new woman he had brought home or be forced to call another woman ‘mum’. She knew, though, there would be consequences to pay. That she couldn’t stay hidden forever. That he would be waiting for her once his girl was gone, ready to make her feel worthless of any love or care.

Absentmindedly, Charity made her way downstairs, almost tripping on the last step. She poured herself a glass of wine. It was the only alcohol she could find without making a racket.

_It was her mother’s birthday, or it would have been if she was still alive. Charity had taken the long way home, walked through the park, through the rustling leaves, stopping by her mother’s headstone; the one she had created. Her father seemed to have made away with everything that could remind Charity of her. She never understood why her mother’s gravestone wasn’t in a cemetery just like everyone else’s, especially when her father was such a devote Christian. He had said she’d been buried close to the beach. It was her favourite place; the last place her mother had been, he used to say. But it was too far away. So she created her own special place. She had etched her mother’s name on a tree and decorated it with hearts. Moss covered everything now, but it was the one thing she had. She played with the flower she had cut on her way there and sat down underneath the long sheltering branches, her head resting against the dewy tree. She took out her report card and read out her marks to her mother. “An avid reader and hard worker. Well done!” her teacher had written. She was proud. Her teacher had smiled at her as she handed it to her. She had done so well._

_“I’m sorry for not buying you anything,” eight-year-old Charity whispered to her mother. “I’ll read something to you instead.”_

_It was only when the shadows grew longer and eerier that she got up from her spot and started heading home. The crisp air caressed her face turning it red._

_“Your father’s looking for you,” Cain shouted from across the street._

_“Since when is he bothered?” she murmured, as she made her way to her front door with her borrowed schoolbook and report card in her hand._

_The door was ajar. She pushed it open, her heart racing in her chest._

_“Where have you been?” a slurred voice called out from the dark corner next to the door. “Been waiting for you.” He straightened up, towering over her. “Mind telling me what this is all about?” he asked, waving a piece of paper in her face._

_She looked at him, ashen-faced._

_“You’ve been bunking off school.”_

_She shook her head as he grabbed her tersely from her arms and dragged her to the kitchen. He flung her against the wall, pausing to take a swig from one of the glass bottles that littered the filthy table. She had tried to keep her mouth shut even though her shoulder had taken the brunt of the fall. She focused on the fly that was drinking from the puddle of spilled drink on the table._

_“Says here, this is a formal warming. There are fines I need to pay, if this continues. You can tell them I’m not paying. They can come collect you if they want.” He threw the paper to her face. “Cat bit your tongue?”_

_She bent down to pick up the paper._

_“Look at me when I’m talking to you,” he yelled, making her jump. Her book and report card slipped from her hand and landed at her feet._

_They were soon in her father’s hand, under his unwavering studious gaze. He looked at her report before a raucous laugh racked his body. “What am I meant to do with this?” he spit. He smiled as their eyes met. Menacingly. He held her gaze, taunting her, as he ripped the paper in pieces.  She knew what was coming next and attempted to plead with him. “It’s not mine,” she said. His smile only grew bigger. He jacked the book from its cover. Its pages rustled in his hands as snippets of paper rained on her._

_“Just so you know, your mother wanted rid of you. This is all your doing. So tell them they’ll be doing us a favour.”_

_He dunked the remains of his bottle, and walked away, bumping into the table, swearing at her, blaming her for it._

By the time, Vanessa came down, she had already drunk half a bottle and bit the skin around her thumb.

“Charity? Thought you went to bed.” She caught sight of the bottle and the glazed, faraway expression on her face. “What’s wrong?”

“Didn’t want to go to bed on my own,” Charity said.

“Something’s bothering you.”

“You’d think we’d opened all the cans of worms in my pathetic life. Turns out life at home was worse than I imagined it. Regardless of all that went on between us, all the agro and grief, I genuinely thought my dad must have loved me. Who would take their kid to the beach everyday, eh? I wouldn’t.” It all came back to her, now; the sound of the seagulls, letting go of her dad’s hand and sprinting to the sea, the splashing of the waves as they crawled up to her toes and ankles, the sullen look on his face.

Vanessa smiled, encouraging her.  

“Only there was a bigger reason to it. My mum was so deliriously happy with him that she drove to the cliffs and straight into the sea... Or so he reckons. He drove her to it, then lied about it. ‘Suicide is sin,’ he said. A sin,” she scoffed. “Prejudice and judgement. He was scared of what people would say, so he lied to me, to the whole family about it. Only her body was never found. So we used to go looking for her.” She looked at Vanessa, the gentle, sympathetic look on her face.  “He was all sanctimonious, except for when it really mattered. When it had anything to do with me. He blames me for it. As he’s always done. But at least I know now. I can’t forget what he did or the way he treated me, but I can understand how he felt and why he did it. And I don’t want my kids to suffer for my past or the way I’ve been treated. I want my kids to feel loved and wanted.”

“They know that.”

Charity shook her head. “Not Noah.”

“He’ll come round. He knows you love him,” Vanessa smiled. “Come here.” She held her hands in hers, tenderly, before Charity’s lips pressed onto hers. Her heart fluttered in its place, as it always did when it came to her.

“And Ness, I promise it’s your turn to open up. To talk about you, your family, past, your mum. Whatever it is. I’m not as good as you, but I’ll do my best to listen.”  

 


End file.
